The World Circular Economy Forum (WCEF) 2023 was recently held in Helsinki, Finland, where the leading multilateral development banks (MDBs) agreed to deepen their cooperation to promote the importance of circular economy in combating the triple planetary crisis of climate change, diversity loss and pollution. Some of the participating banks were the African Development Bank (AfDB), the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD), the European Investment Bank (EIB), the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB), IDB Invest and the World Bank.

The institutions agreed to continue working together, through the Circularity Exchange Network (CEN) -a network that allows MDBs to exchange knowledge about the circular economy-, as well as providing a platform to work collaboratively on standards, tools and products to facilitate activities and circular projects.

Some of the objectives that the MDBs set themselves are:

• Link circularity with key environmental objectives and, in particular, with the objectives of the Paris Agreement
• Improve and align impact assessment methods for investments in the circular economy
• Aim to increase the proportion of high-impact circular projects in lending and investment practices
• Build internal (MDB) and external (project partners) capacity to use the circular economy as a strategy to achieve economic success and resilience in client countries
• Develop mechanisms to de-risk investments in the circular economy and facilitate better access to blended finance through public-private collaboration